About ten years ago MacJams was a thriving hotbed of musical collaboration and exploration. Members put their political and cultural differences aside and worked together on a wide range of projects and "challenges". However, this Camelot was not viewed by all with the same fondness.

I know that I learned a lot at that time and the years leading up to it, enjoying collaborations and interactions with folk from all walks and backgrounds, even our Texicans (said with love and a smile). Some people would like to be able to step back into that river, but alas it has moved on. As they say, "You can't step in the same river twice".

Sadly there are still hurt feelings and and more than a little scorched earth remaining after all these years (along with many defected members and some sadly departed as well). Politics and culture wars seem to be impossible to keep out of social media. MacJams did a pretty good job of it by my estimation - until it didn't.

Everything is temporary. I sure had fun while it lasted.

It's better to regret something you have done, than something you haven't done.

While I have sometimes posted political comments and/or political rebuttals – and have been chastised for them, and have owned-up to my words and taken my lumps – I also continue to see Great Music being posted here almost every day.

The one thing that I miss – or do not know now how to find – is the “random song picker” which used to be a prominent feature of the home-page. This web-site has a very, very big catalog of songs which stretches back a very long time, and this feature used to serve-up a never ending variety of music drawn from that catalog.

So, even though we are now being spoon-fed political hyperlinks every day in the forum, we don’t even have to visit it. We can still enjoy great music, the likes of which you really don’t find elsewhere.

Times do move on. I still contribute to another music site and it's exactly the same.

10 years ago there were collabs happening and new songs being posted everyday.

Then it all just started to fall away. It wasn't political arguments or disagreements that caused the decline. It seems to me that people lost interest, moved on, started posting on FB maybe but whatever the reason they stopped posting there.

Sure there are a still a few old hands on there but now we're lucky if we see one song a week.

I personally know some of the people who faded away from there and from here and it seems they lost interest, started families, got bored, started playing live, changed focus, whatever.

The common denominator was the fact there was no common denominator.

For me, I ran out of ideas, had a bit of a breakdown, lost confidence and my muse went missing. I was still writing but very sporadically. Recently MJ became almost unusable for me as I couldn't sign on. I know the functionality issues also put people off coming here.

It's still stumbling rather than walking and a long way from running but it's thriving compared to other sites I know !

It's good to see songs being posted every day and collabs still happening (even if not to the same level as they were before)

I personally think that MJ was struck a huge blow when the random song-picker disappeared, because this feature showcased the sheer number of songs ... good songs ... that still exist here.

There are plenty of sites out there which are hyping the notion that you are one blockbuster away from being able to shop for hot-rods and mansions for the rest of your life (especially if you buy my promotion services, heh ...), but not so many that actually provide good music.

MJ is one of them, but today, if they stumble upon it, do they see those songs? Not anymore.